The present invention is based, in general, on the field of agriculture and the processing of harvested crops. Vehicles designed to pick up and process crops—in particular self-propelled agricultural harvesting machines—are used for this purpose. The self-propelled agricultural harvesting machines are typically combine harvesters, forage harvesters, and all types of lifters that are equipped with devices for processing and conveying the crop material. The discharge device is a conveyance device of this type. The discharge device is used to transfer al of the crop material to a hauling vehicle or an attached transport container. During the harvesting operation, the harvesting machines pick up crop material continuously, process it in a known manner, and transfer it to a hauling vehicle that is being driven alongside or behind, the transferring taking place continuously, e.g., with a self-propelled forage harvester, or after intermediate storage, e.g., with a combine harvester. The crop material is transferred using a transfer device, which, on a combine harvester, is a discharge device, for example. With a combine harvester, the discharge device may be a grain tank discharge pipe. With a forage harvester, the discharge device may be an upper discharge chute with a transfer-device cover on the end. A discharge device is used to transfer the crop material from a self-propelled harvesting machine and a hauling vehicle with minimal loss. To this end, the discharge device is equipped with a control device for performing automatic or manual adjustments, and the self-propelled agricultural harvesting machine is equipped with a navigation system for determining the positions of the vehicles involved.
Vehicles of this type, in particular self-propelled agricultural harvesting machines with a transfer device for transferring the crop material to a hauling vehicle or a transport container—the device including a discharge device, a control device for adjusting the discharge device, the transfer-device cover, and the crop discharge flow, and including a navigation system for determining the relative positions of the vehicles involved, and including data transmission between the vehicles—are adequately known from the related art. Various methods for automatically filling hauling vehicles—in the case of a forage harvester—by automatically moving the upper discharge chute are known. One example is described in EP 1 454 520 A1. The aforementioned EP describes a control for positioning a discharge device in accordance with its degrees of freedom, with which the ejection height, i.e., the height at which material is ejected from the discharge device, may be maintained, regardless of the ground level and the rotation around the vertical axis. The disadvantage of this control device is that it does not account for the relative speed and position of the hauling vehicle, for instance. As a result, it is not possible to determine the impact point of the crop material on the hauling vehicle into which the crop material is filled.
To eliminate the disadvantage described above, various methods are described in this context for determining the position of the vehicles involved and their dimensions.
A device of this type for identifying the position and determining the dimensions of self-propelled agricultural vehicles is disclosed in DE 100 64 862 A1. The disclosed object relates to a navigation system installed in the vehicles that ascertains the relative position of the vehicles involved—between which crop material is to be transferred—e.g., a harvesting machine and a hauling vehicle. The data that are determined are used to better coordinate the vehicles with each other. The data are also used to control the discharge device. That is, an adjustment of the discharge device is calculated based on the current position of the harvesting vehicle and the hauling vehicle. In addition, the data that were determined are also used to calculate the theoretical impact point of the crop material on the hauling vehicle based on the dimensions of the transport container and/or the hauling vehicle and the current position of the discharge device. If the impact point of the crop material is outside of the transport container, a warning message is generated.
To further reduce or minimize the loss of crop material during transfer, the impact point of the crop material on the hauling vehicle must be defined and controlled even more exactly.
A control for the discharge device was therefore provided in unexamined patent application DE 10 2004 052 298 A1, which reduces permanent control of the transfer process by the driver and ensures that the crop material is transferred to the hauling vehicle with fewer losses. The goal of this automation is to position a continuous crop discharge flow within a specified geometry. The defined geometry is composed of a virtual grid that encloses a partial region or the entire region of the harvesting vehicle, and therefore also covers the hauling vehicle. The grid is composed of a large number of fields. Using the crop discharge flow control, the driver may guide the crop discharge flow to the controllable fields of the virtual grid when the crop material is transferred from the discharge device.
Overall, the transfer of crop material is oriented to the position and size of the virtual grid, and to the size and position of the fields, so that the range of rotation of the discharge device is determined by the virtual grid and the virtual fields. This disadvantage of this design of the control for the discharge device is that the driver of the self-propelled agricultural harvesting machine must still steer the discharge device and the crop material discharge flow in order to adjust the impact point of the crop material on the transport surface such that the crop material is transferred with fewer losses overall and is not conveyed past the hauling vehicle and left on the field as a loss.